I’ll admit that football on a Wednesday seems a little strange. In general, I’m happy to have more days to watch games, but if you’re trying to win a championship this week it can be challenging. Instead of the regular Thursday-Sunday-Monday format, you also have games on Wednesday and Saturday, which means you need to make decisions faster. Throw in the waiver wire schedule, and you might only have hours to finalize parts of the most important lineup of the year.
While that doesn’t sound like an ideal situation, it does present some unique opportunities for fantasy managers, especially those in redraft leagues.
First of all, you’ll get some early returns before you have to make any final lineup decisions. By the time Sunday rolls around you’ll have the results of six NFL games, including some of the top fantasy players. On Christmas night alone, you’ll know how Derrick Henry, Nico Collins, Patrick Mahomes and others performed. You might already be way ahead, or facing a large deficit. That’s good knowledge to have if you’re deciding between players with high floors or high ceilings. You might need to take more chances, or be able to take less risk. Having that extra information can help you make better decisions, even if the decision is not to make any changes at all.
Second, you can use the schedule to maximize your roster. Not going to start Isiah Pacheco? Don’t leave him locked on your bench. Drop him Wednesday morning, and pick up somebody who plays later in the week. Even if you don’t use them, you’ll have another option to consider and you’ll prevent your opponent from getting them. The more viable players you have on your roster, the better, and a locked player is wasting a spot. This is the end of the road, so don’t worry about having a stacked bench. Drop anybody you won’t be using on the day of their game, and pick up a potential starter who’s playing later in the week. Unexpected injuries and coaching decisions can happen right before Sunday, so be as prepared as possible.
Oh and if your league doesn’t have decimal scoring, and uses bench scores to break ties, you can get rid of low-scoring guys and load up on players who get more snaps on game day. A bad quarterback might outscore a good backup player, so why not inflate those bench points? It probably won’t come into play, but giving yourself even a tiny advantage is worth it. You never know.
Or maybe your opponent’s kicker or defense has a lousy matchup, and they aren’t addressing it early in the week. In that case, it’s completely appropriate to drop guys you definitely won’t use, and pick up the best options still on the waiver wire. Picking up and dropping guys just to trigger the website’s hold on those players is absolutely unethical and shouldn’t be allowed. But making room on your roster to keep and hold positions so your opponent can’t consider them? That’s a smart defensive strategy.
Your team made it this far, so you owe it to them to use every legal and ethical trick up your sleeve to tilt things in your favor. Using the league’s schedule to your advantage is just common sense.
Now, it’s possible (even likely) that none of this will make any difference in your game’s outcome. Maybe it’s a waste of time, like drafting those bench players back in August that never cracked your starting lineup. There are no guarantees in fantasy football, and there’s a lot that we don’t control. Because of that fact, I think it’s important to focus on what we can control, and do our best with it. Because it just might make a tiny difference, and that could be all the difference you need to win a championship. Good luck this week.
How do you handle the extra days of football? Does your strategy change at all? Will you be watching the games on Christmas day? Share your thoughts below.